Lightweight laptop replacement - Medical condition

[Kerouactivist]

I need to replace my Samsung Chromebook+ ( 2.38 lbs) as its security updates are expy in august. Looking for something lightweight but I don't travel as much as a I did before so could go up a little in weight and screen size, but definitely wanna keep it travel friendly. I like the chrome operating system but would am definitely open to windows as well, I want a good keyboard experience, great screen! and semi decent at least battery life, decent audio would be a plus but not a necessity. I will use this computer primarily for heavy multi tabbed internet browsing , investing accounts, and ocassionaly watching movies and some youtube.

I will primarily use this laptop while lying on my belly with pillows propping me at my chest due to my medical state which makes me bed ridden alot

My other digital devices are a Pixel 6 Pro and a gaming laptop (MSI 2080 Geforce) which I don't use very often anymore as I don't game and when I do use it is for pretty low graphic intense games (think Civ). that is bulky and a stay at home. My budget is anywhere from $500-1200 USD and maybe a little more for the right fit as needed.

I've looked at chromebooks and can't seem to find as many lightweight ones as in the past, maybe I'm missing something.

Any ideas one the best bang for my use given my medical state and etc as I'll primarily use this lying in bed it creates perhaps some odd or different needs.

Thanks ahead of time for any and all help.

 

[sdifox]

Why not a tablet with bt keyboard?

 

[igor_kavinski]

I want a good keyboard experience, great screen! and semi decent at least battery life, decent audio would be a plus but not a necessity. I will use this computer primarily for heavy multi tabbed internet browsing , investing accounts, and ocassionaly watching movies and some youtube.

Those requirements are gonna need lots of RAM (32 GB minimum for multi tabbed browsing) so laptops with LPDDR4X/5X are out as they would be hard to find and too expensive. You could maybe make do with 16 GB LPDDR5X but you may need to constrain the number of tabs. Great display, good keyboard, decent battery life. These things aren't going to all be available in a bang for buck laptop (could be but you would have to comb the internet with a microscope).

Check these out:

Zenbook S 13 OLED (UM5302, AMD Ryzen 6000 series)｜Laptops For Home｜ASUS Global

Zenbook is compact, thin and light, with the best innovative laptop technology, NanoEdge displays, precision craftsmanship, and uncompromising performance.

www.asus.com

Zenbook S 13 Flip OLED (UP5302, 12th Gen Intel)｜Laptops For Home｜ASUS Global

Zenbook is compact, thin and light, with the best innovative laptop technology, NanoEdge displays, precision craftsmanship, and uncompromising performance.

www.asus.com

Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED review: the MacBook Air alternative

Portable power for $1,299.

www.theverge.com

Amazon.com

 

[Kerouactivist]

Why not a tablet with bt keyboard?

I definitely wouldnt' be against it as long as the keyboard and tablet could set on a bed easily and be typed on without it falling over etc.

 

[sdifox]

I definitely wouldnt' be against it as long as the keyboard and tablet could set on a bed easily and be typed on without it falling over etc.

example, not recommendation. they have a video to give you an idea of how it works

Amazon.ca

 

[Kerouactivist]

Those requirements are gonna need lots of RAM (32 GB minimum for multi tabbed browsing) so laptops with LPDDR4X/5X are out as they would be hard to find and too expensive. You could maybe make do with 16 GB LPDDR5X but you may need to constrain the number of tabs. Great display, good keyboard, decent battery life. These things aren't going to all be available in a bang for buck laptop (could be but you would have to comb the internet with a microscope).

Check these out:

Zenbook S 13 OLED (UM5302, AMD Ryzen 6000 series)｜Laptops For Home｜ASUS Global

Zenbook is compact, thin and light, with the best innovative laptop technology, NanoEdge displays, precision craftsmanship, and uncompromising performance.

www.asus.com

Zenbook S 13 Flip OLED (UP5302, 12th Gen Intel)｜Laptops For Home｜ASUS Global

Zenbook is compact, thin and light, with the best innovative laptop technology, NanoEdge displays, precision craftsmanship, and uncompromising performance.

www.asus.com

Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED review: the MacBook Air alternative

Portable power for $1,299.

www.theverge.com

Amazon.com

Thanks for the reccomendation, I'd certainly be open to going up in price for the right device, I will definitely check out the zenbooks that you listed in further detail and did watch the video review and they seem to be close or do meet the requirements I'm looking for. I know I'm kinda looking for a good at too many things kind of scenario...and know I'll have to make some trade offs.

 

[bigboxes]

example, not recommendation. they have a video to give you an idea of how it works

Amazon.ca

I have the original Tab Pro S 10". Was perfect for taking on the road. Pair it up with a bluetooth speaker and connect it to my Plex Server at home. Great for the motel room. Don't use it much anymore. Never got a bluetooth keyboard for it. I do have that style of case, though. I got it for free since it was a pre-order for the tablet.

 

[sdifox]

Those requirements are gonna need lots of RAM (32 GB minimum for multi tabbed browsing) so laptops with LPDDR4X/5X are out as they would be hard to find and too expensive. You could maybe make do with 16 GB LPDDR5X but you may need to constrain the number of tabs. Great display, good keyboard, decent battery life. These things aren't going to all be available in a bang for buck laptop (could be but you would have to comb the internet with a microscope).

Check these out:

Zenbook S 13 OLED (UM5302, AMD Ryzen 6000 series)｜Laptops For Home｜ASUS Global

Zenbook is compact, thin and light, with the best innovative laptop technology, NanoEdge displays, precision craftsmanship, and uncompromising performance.

www.asus.com

Zenbook S 13 Flip OLED (UP5302, 12th Gen Intel)｜Laptops For Home｜ASUS Global

Zenbook is compact, thin and light, with the best innovative laptop technology, NanoEdge displays, precision craftsmanship, and uncompromising performance.

www.asus.com

Asus Zenbook S 13 OLED review: the MacBook Air alternative

Portable power for $1,299.

www.theverge.com

Amazon.com

LoL 32GB ram for browsing... Given fast flash storage, you'll barely notice paging, so no, you don't need 32gb of ram to browse.


This is probably good enough for op.

https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-VivoBook-Display-Quad-Core-T3300KA-DH26T/dp/B09MDN7Y76/ref=mp_s_a_1_3?crid=132TLUXZ5MMYB&keywords=vivobook+slate+13+oled&qid=1685388804&sprefix=vivoboom+slat%2Caps%2C370&sr=8-3&ufe=app_do%3Aamzn1.fos.2b70bf2b-6730-4ccf-ab97-eb60747b8daf

 

[manly]

Those requirements are gonna need lots of RAM (32 GB minimum for multi tabbed browsing) so laptops with LPDDR4X/5X are out as they would be hard to find and too expensive. You could maybe make do with 16 GB LPDDR5X but you may need to constrain the number of tabs. Great display, good keyboard, decent battery life. These things aren't going to all be available in a bang for buck laptop (could be but you would have to comb the internet with a microscope).

Didn't you say last year in OT that Chrome isn't excessively memory hungry for you? And although I disagreed at the time, Chrome has since added tab unloading (like all major browsers do). Seriously though, 16GB is gonna be fine for his use cases. It's still worth thinking hard about, because many superportable systems now use soldered RAM.

I prefer a tablet (specifically iPad 10"+) for media consumption in bed, but the value proposition is somewhat worse (smaller screen, less RAM, keyboard sold separately).

I suppose ChromeOS Flex on current device is also an option.

 

[crashtech]

Just as an experiment I popped open about 50 tabs and my PC is using less than 12GB with several other productivity apps open as well. So I think 16GB is more than adequate unless some unmentioned RAM heavy app is also being used concurrently.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Didn't you say last year in OT that Chrome isn't excessively memory hungry for you?

Yeah. Chrome is usually not the problem for me. It stays open with hundreds of tabs but I browse AT forums, Youtube and do other reading on Firefox which tends to eat up all available RAM (sometimes it will be something as simple as a stupid imgur tab that I forgot to close. May be consuming up to 3 GB RAM or more!). I also prefer some cool Firefox features like taking a single screenshot of an article, even those spanning multiple pages.

I also have Tor and Brave open at the same time. No issues with Brave so far. Tor can sometimes be a problem but mostly it's more well behaved than Firefox. Maybe coz I mainly open tabs of a single site that is blocked in UAE.

One reason I dislike 16GB is coz I've seen Windows taking up to 6 GB RAM by itself with nothing running. I'm sure it will free up some of that RAM when the need arises but that would cause paging and it would reduce the SSD life, particularly if it's a cheapo TLC or worse, QLC at sizes 512GB and below.

I know my browsing habits are atypical but I don't see how I can be the only one who likes having different browsers open at the same time. That will demand more RAM than someone sticking with a preferred browser.

 

[sdifox]

How do you even navigate hundreds of tabs? A dozen is tops for me.

Write life should be the least of your concerns even with QLC.

I have different browsers open when I need to ensure session isolation validating an app.

 

[manly]

Yeah. Chrome is usually not the problem for me. It stays open with hundreds of tabs but I browse AT forums, Youtube and do other reading on Firefox which tends to eat up all available RAM (sometimes it will be something as simple as a stupid imgur tab that I forgot to close. May be consuming up to 3 GB RAM or more!). I also prefer some cool Firefox features like taking a single screenshot of an article, even those spanning multiple pages.

I also have Tor and Brave open at the same time. No issues with Brave so far. Tor can sometimes be a problem but mostly it's more well behaved than Firefox. Maybe coz I mainly open tabs of a single site that is blocked in UAE.

One reason I dislike 16GB is coz I've seen Windows taking up to 6 GB RAM by itself with nothing running. I'm sure it will free up some of that RAM when the need arises but that would cause paging and it would reduce the SSD life, particularly if it's a cheapo TLC or worse, QLC at sizes 512GB and below.

I know my browsing habits are atypical but I don't see how I can be the only one who likes having different browsers open at the same time. That will demand more RAM than someone sticking with a preferred browser.

Wait so which is it, does 99.99 percentile browsing behavior require 32GB RAM or doesn't it? OK so yeah different browsers can behave differently, but obviously you're an outlier in your usage patterns. I can relate to your usage patterns and experiencing memory pressure, but it isn't going to apply to most people.

(Besides SSD excessive wear) There's really nothing wrong with swapping, as long as it's not leading to thrashing. I rarely use Windows, but I find it hard to believe the OS alone consumes 6GB RAM.

How do you even navigate hundreds of tabs? A dozen is tops for me.

I can't speak for others, but the UI doesn't really support navigating hundreds of tabs. However, I leave dozens "open" more or less as bookmarks, but am not regularly accessing so many on a daily basis. Leaving excessive tabs open is kind of a thing on Safari mobile, because it aggressively unloads tabs so there isn't any RAM overhead if you never close background tabs.

 

[igor_kavinski]

That's one of the ten Chrome windows I have open. I rarely need to open so many tabs that they become too small to click reliably but I've been there a few times and used CTRL-PGUP/PGDN to cycle through them.

Firefox doesn't need multiple windows open but it has a really bad infinite tab scroll UI which can be a nightmare to cycle through if you mistakenly end up on the last tab by opening the settings tab or something.

My last two vacations, I was busy doing stupid coding school stuff that didn't give me enough time to do a spring cleaning of my open tabs. Maybe in the next vacation? I get only one day off per week and that is spent sleeping and recuperating from the sometimes pretty stressful work week. And no, coding isn't my job since I'm still not reliably good at it.

 

[igor_kavinski]

I can relate to your usage patterns and experiencing memory pressure, but it isn't going to apply to most people.

OP said heavy multi tabbed browsing so not sure what he considers heavy. The thing about multiple tabs is, you never get the time to go through them all so you tend to leave your laptop plugged in and in sleep mode so you can resume later. It may result in Windows uptime of days and that can often cause memory to leak with bad sites (it's hard to tell which ones when you are researching stuff).

But yes, in general, the OP may not have issues with 16 GB RAM. That doesn't mean he will never run into them. If and when he does and if he has paid a lot of money for the type of sleek laptop he is looking for, it may cause him to regret his decision for going with only 16 GB.

We also don't know what the future will bring. It's possible that Windows 12 may be centered around AI and that needs access to lots of data in RAM to provide useful responses. If it's a cheap $500 laptop, I guess 16 GB is acceptable for the price. But for something like $1000 or more, 32 GB RAM should be the minimum for a better return on investment.

 

[sdifox]

you are doing something really wrong when you need to schedule time to clean up your browser tabs lol
I just opened a dozen youtube links and with 1 rdp session in addition to firefox I am at 7GB of ram use.

 

[igor_kavinski]

you are doing something really wrong when you need to schedule time to clean up your browser tabs lol

Won't argue with that

 

[manly]

OP said heavy multi tabbed browsing so not sure what he considers heavy. The thing about multiple tabs is, you never get the time to go through them all so you tend to leave your laptop plugged in and in sleep mode so you can resume later. It may result in Windows uptime of days and that can often cause memory to leak with bad sites (it's hard to tell which ones when you are researching stuff).

But yes, in general, the OP may not have issues with 16 GB RAM. That doesn't mean he will never run into them. If and when he does and if he has paid a lot of money for the type of sleek laptop he is looking for, it may cause him to regret his decision for going with only 16 GB.

We also don't know what the future will bring. It's possible that Windows 12 may be centered around AI and that needs access to lots of data in RAM to provide useful responses. If it's a cheap $500 laptop, I guess 16 GB is acceptable for the price. But for something like $1000 or more, 32 GB RAM should be the minimum for a better return on investment.

Suffice to say even most "power users" don't have hundreds of browser tabs lying around. What did you do, buy up all of Humble Bundle? How many lifetimes will it take to play through your Steam library?

The actual cost of DDR4 has plummeted, so I don't disagree that 32GB could be a reasonable choice for long-term ownership. Esp. if the memory is non-upgradeable. (For the OP, 24GB is probably plenty but won't operate in dual-channel?)

Safari on mobile has a bug where if the browser is forcibly killed, you can lose all of your tabs. It's happened to me the past and in that moment, I'm annoyed at losing a bunch of state. But obviously it's not a big deal because I still don't bookmark articles I plan to read later. However, mobile Safari does preserve private browser tabs even across OS upgrades. Whereas Android simply disappears all Incognito tabs if the main browser process is restarted (i.e. on a Chrome app update).

 

[igor_kavinski]

What did you do, buy up all of Humble Bundle? How many lifetimes will it take to play through your Steam library?

Those are the purchases for which I need to set aside time to claim them coz they are not games. I've actually lost a few bundles coz their "must claim by" date was only 31st December

As for Steam, I'm more of a game explorer than a game player. The longest RPG style games I played are Bloodnet and KOTOR and didn't finish them after a few days of playing. Action adventure games don't need more than two or three days of focused gameplay. I bet less than third of my Steam library is comprised of games I would actually get hooked on. The thing with bundles is, you find one interesting game that is priced on Steam more than the price of the entire bundle so you get that one game for $10 along with 5 or 6 other games you may never want to launch but add to Steam anyway coz why not?

 

[manly]

Those are the purchases for which I need to set aside time to claim them coz they are not games. I've actually lost a few bundles coz their "must claim by" date was only 31st December

As for Steam, I'm more of a game explorer than a game player. The longest RPG style games I played are Bloodnet and KOTOR and didn't finish them after a few days of playing. Action adventure games don't need more than two or three days of focused gameplay. I bet less than third of my Steam library is comprised of games I would actually get hooked on. The thing with bundles is, you find one interesting game that is priced on Steam more than the price of the entire bundle so you get that one game for $10 along with 5 or 6 other games you may never want to launch but add to Steam anyway coz why not?

Does "must claim by" apply to game bundles? I've bought a few bundles going back 10 years, but don't think I've ever claimed a single code yet. Earlier this year, the Turkey-Syria quake relief bundle had dozens of items in it. Guess I could try and see what happens.

As for gaming, I haven't actually played anything in a long time. I have a few dozen games sitting in Steam, including a new purchase last night lol. At least my excuse is that I haven't had a real gaming PC in a long, long time.

To get back on topic, it's a great time to buy PC components or a laptop. Sales have crashed hard, and the OEMs are having fire sales on a lot of stuff. Even some GPUs are reasonable buys, esp. for those willing to buy used.

 

[igor_kavinski]

Does "must claim by" apply to game bundles?

Usually not for Steam games. But for Epic/EA Origin games, that's possible. I know I lost at least one big title from Epic or Origin due to this "fun" limitation.

Steam keys may have other issues. I know of at least one old game I wanted to add for which Humble Bundle ran out of Steam keys and several years later, has not replenished it! A Steam key may also not work if you didn't add it before it got delisted from the Steam marketplace.

One day I decided to look into my Indiegala purchase history. Turned out I hadn't claimed few dozen bundles. That day I wasted several hours but at the end, I was happy with the knowledge of adding over 100 interesting looking games to my Steam library